Law Student Services - Electronic Resources
| Electronic Databases | Passwords & PINs | LexisNexis & Westlaw | |
| BNA | CALI | CCH | Casemaker |
Electronic Databases Page
The Electronic Resources Page lists databases of legal information and nonlegal information useful to law students. There are more non-legal databases accessible via University Library's Research Databases . Many of the databases are available off-campus with a Scholar PIN.
Law Student Usernames, Passwords, IDs and PINS
Law Student Usernames, Passwords, IDs and PINS explains the various usernames, passwords and PINS you will be issued as a Cleveland-Marshall College of Law Student.
CALI
CALI (The Center for Computer-Assisted Legal Instruction) develops interactive computerized lessons on many legal subject areas. Some of the over 600 lessons teach basic lawyering skills, such as legal research and writing and trial advocacy, and others instruct students on how to prepare for classes and take law school exams. You can search the CALI Library of Lessons for a particular legal concept (eg, the rule against perpetuities). Faculty sometimes use CALI Lessons to cover material not discussed in class, as well as incorporate CALI Lessons into their courses as assignments or in-class exercises.
If you are a Cleveland-Marshall College of Law student, click here for registration instructions.
All College of Law incoming students also receive a DVD of CALI Lessons.
BNA E-mail Current Awareness Services
- BNA provides: (1) Libraries with analysis and primary source material; and (2) E-mail current awareness services on many topics.
- To access remotely, use the links on the Electronic Resources Page, or on this blog post.
- Help: Ask a law librarian or click "contact us" at the top of the BNA screen.
- One of the best known BNA current awareness services is U.S. Law Week. This email service:
- Summarizes selected new state and federal cases which establish new precedents, address new statutes or further splits in the Circuits.
- Tracks every Supreme Court petition and case on the docket, from filing to final disposition.
- Provides articles on important legal developments.
CCH -
- CCH provides primary and secondary sources on an array of topics, as well as current awareness emails
- The library subscribes to two different CCH databases: CCH Business and Finance (Securities, Business Organizations, Intellectual Property & more) and CCH Health and Human Resources (Labor & Employment, Environmental Law, Health Care). For a list of topics, and a list of titles contained in these databases, see the Electronic Resources Page.
- To sign up for current awareness emails, click on Sign Up for Email Delivery (top righthand corner). Fill in the information and click Apply Changes. Then click on Tracker Email Options, click on the tab Add Tracker Searches. Select a tracker, and add search terms to narrow the search, if desired.
- Indexes - a nice feature of CCH and BNA too. Lexis & Westlaw databases often do not have an index.
- Help: Ask a law librarian or when you are in subject folder, you will see a blue link for chat help. At the bottom of the page is a url for help http://support.cch.com and phone numbers.
LexisNexis and Westlaw
LexisNexis and Westlaw provide access to databases composed of cases, statutes, regulations, law review articles, newspaper articles and more. The law school pages for LexisNexis and Westlaw contain tutorials on how to use the databases.
There are links to LexisNexis and Westlaw from the Quicklinks pulldown menu on the library home page.
Passwords: You will receive your LexisNexis and Westlaw passwords at Orientation. For registration instructions, go to Law Student Usernames, Passwords, IDs & PINS.
For help with passwords, contact Laura Ray.
Acceptable Use: You can use these databases only for school-related research purposes. It is a violation of the Student Honor Code to use these databanks for nonacademic work. Violators may be subject to loss of LexisNexis/Westlaw privileges and expulsion from school.
Printing: Send print jobs to the Lexis and Westlaw printers. This does not count against your annual allotment of 1,000 printer pages, but you are restricted to 200 pages per day.
Printing in excess of this amount may result in cancellation of the print request and/or suspension of your ability to print to these printers. Students found to be printing excessively will receive warning email notices before suspension of their printing abilities.
Help: Ask a law librarian for help, use Lexis and Westlaw online chat or call a Lexis/Westlaw reference attorney. (To access phone numbers and live chat: On Lexis, click on the "live support" link. On Westlaw, click on the Help link in the top right hand corner.)
More information: see LexisNexis and Westlaw For Students;
LexisNexis and Westlaw Features Compared Guide;
LexisNexis/Westlaw "Saved Searches" .
Lexis and Westlaw Orientation Materials: Registering your Activation Code/Password and Exercises
Casemaker
- Free with Ohio State Bar Association membership
- Law students may join for free, as well as for the first year of new admittees to the Ohio Bar. For additional information and a membership application form, connect to: http://www.ohiobar.org/join/?articleid=272
- Case law and statutes for 50 states, U.S. Code, U.S. Supreme Court decisions, recent federal appellate, district court and bankruptcy opinions.
- May contain other state materials such as court rules, attorney general opinions and jury instructions.